You chose the example of Russia, where ordinary apolitical people are not losing their property or their lives at random (in fact Putin put a stop to a lot of that). I'm not going to argue about the nature or reality of the Trump dictatorship, as you set out in your ground rules, but I am going to insist you stick to your ground rules yourself.CS wrote: ↑Sun Aug 30, 2020 7:26 amUnder the assumptions of this thought experiment this is not true, or a good chance not true depending on who you are in ways that are immutable. This thinking is how a lot of people lost their lives in Germany and a lot of others did nothing about it to keep their heads down.
Someone made a poem about it in fact, “First they came for...”
I don't grasp the implied scenario here. You think either SK or NK would intentionally start a nuclear war with the other?In truly desperate times that might not be enough. Taking out Seoul would leave a lot of countryside untouched.
I saw a talk summer 2019 of a Hiroshima survivor and was shocked at how small the weapon range was. Yes, modern weapons as much bigger, but still, it is a bomb with limited scope outside of shockwaves. I would have bought the man’s book in a heartbeat but he haven’t written one. His family was taking care of him at the conference and it was cute to see. He also told off helping victims before they passed away. Getting to attend that talk is probably one of the more significance events of my life.
Being naturalised in SK or Japan is notionally possible and it is proved by a tiny number of examples. But the process is made deliberately difficult, and the numbers are tiny even relative to the numbers of permanent residents in those countries.Citizenship can be obtained in many places, including SK.
It would have been obviously beneficial to Russia to control the USA at any point in modern history, just as it would've been obviously beneficial to Belgium to control France, Denmark to control Germany, etc.Didn’t think about in China that way in regards to Russia. It is another logical reason why Russia is pushing so hard for control of the USA right now, beyond ridding themselves of sanctions. Wielding the long arm and financial ump of the US military against their scary neighbor would probably make Putin a happy man.
Anyway, without going too much off on a tangent, the point with relevance to the OP is that Russian neighbours in the west are very likely to retain their independence.